daniel kok / diskodanny.com
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Daniel Kok studied Fine Art & Critical Theory (Goldsmiths College, London), Solo/Dance/Authorship (HZT, Berlin) and Advanced Performance and Scenography Studies (APASS, Brussels). In 2008, he received the Young Artist Award from the National Arts Council (Singapore).
His artistic research explores the politics of inter-subjective relationality. By drawing a key distinction between spectatorship and audienceship, he highlights the tension between the experience of an individual and that of a group. From 2010 to 2018, he created performances through ‘figures of performance’ - such as the pole dancer, cheerleader, and military commander - each engaging the crowd through specific tools and protocols.
Since 2014, he has collaborated with Melbourne-based artist Luke George on a performance practice based on rope bondage that investigates collective negotiations of consent and intimacy. Their performances are live experiments in democratic politics and acquiescence, welcoming failure as part of a radical approach to consensus and coalescence. Their work has been presented across the Asia-Pacific, Europe, and North America, including at the Venice Biennale, AsiaTOPA (Melbourne), Singapore International Festival of Arts, and Taipei Arts Festival. Still Lives: Melbourne won Outstanding Contemporary and Experimental Performance and Design/Technical Achievement at the 2023 Green Room Awards.
As Artistic Director of DANCE NUCLEUS (Singapore), Daniel develops capacity for independent artists and builds trans-local partnerships across the Asia-Pacific. He regularly coaches younger artists in the formulation of their praxes across four domains - Research, Creation, Production, and Dissemination - treating independent artistic production as a question of dramaturgy in and of itself. He also curates the da:ns LAB coaching programme and the VECTOR exhibition of performance annually with support from the Esplanade (Singapore).
Daniel Kok is based between Singapore and Berlin.
C.V.
11.The Stripper’s Practice, 2013
Daniel Kok
Pole Dance Installation
The Stripper’s Practice is a study that evolved into installation art, durational performance and a lecture of sorts.
I look at the figure of the stripper as an archetype to unpack performative labour, dance and spectatorship as economic exchange. The work is also an exercise in practising spectatorship as a collective and pluralist experience.
A pole dancer performs a pole dance that lasts for up to 3 hours while the song, “I Want To Know What Love Is” by Foreigner plays on repeat. Spectators can freely come and go, take any seat and change seats. Spectators may also stand around in other parts of the gallery. A piece of text, divided into 8 parts is printed and distributed onto 8 different chairs:
Rules of Engagement in a Strip-Encounter
#1 - Voluntary Submission of Power
#2 – Dialogic Encounter
#3 - Individualized Gaze
#4 - Finite Capital
#5 – Heterogeneous Body
#6 – Suspension of Climax
#7 – Expenditure
#8 – Surplus & Loss
Text for The Stripper’s Practice 8 RULES FOR A STRIP-ACT